British English and American English

For quite a long time now, English has informally been considered as the official language of the world. There are many considerations before any language can be deemed the official means of communication for all countries, of course, and as such there has not been a formal declaration of this but for anyone who has had dealings with various countries worldwide, it is quite obvious that English is the main language by which you can communicate with other nationalities. Where did English come from? Why is it spoken so prevalently? The answers to these questions entail a long and arduous journey, which unfortunately cannot be covered in one blog post.

However, there is one aspect of the English language that we can take a look at today – the differences between American and British English. I cannot count the many times that I have heard quips about both “versions” of the language from Americans and British alike. Indeed, there are marked differences between the two varieties. However, who is to say that one is more correct than the other?

Here are some typical differences between American English and British English.

Use of the Present Perfect Tense
For those who are not familiar with their grammar tags, the present perfect is basically the form which makes use of has/have + past participle. An example would be: have eaten, have gone, and so on.

We could say that in British English, the use of this tense is “stricter” as opposed to American English. For example, the sentence “I already saw that movie.” would be accepted in American English but in British English, it should be “I have already seen that movie.” would be the proper way of saying it.